


5 Times Daisy Touches Coulson's Wrists (and one time she doesn't)

by RowboatCop



Category: Agents of SHIELD - Fandom
Genre: Anal Fingering, F/M, Light Bondage, Light Dom/sub, Non-Explicit Sex, connected by kree blood, coulson is a delicate flower, coulson's wrists, daisy johnson pov, daisy's issues with control, thejcexchange
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 13:28:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9183658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RowboatCop/pseuds/RowboatCop
Summary: Cousy, Cosmic Connections, and Choices.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [zauberer_sirin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/gifts).



1.

“ _Come back_.”

She wraps her fingers around his wrists and holds onto him, tries to pull him back from wherever he is, wherever this machine has taken him in his own mind. His face is twisted in pain, stained with blood, and beaded with sweat, but it’s _Coulson’s_ face. And it’s only been a few weeks, she doesn’t know how his face has become so dear to her...but it has. He has.

“Skye,” he breathes her name, _comes back_ , and the relief is too much to contain. He was almost gone, almost another person she had lost, but he’s here. He’s back. “Skye,” he whispers her name again, again like it means something, like it means everything.

She presses her closed lips against his hands — not a kiss, more just a way to contain herself, to hold back the tears standing in her eyes —  and feels the light scratch of hair and then the bones of his wrists. They’re so delicate, so breakable, so fragile and human under her fingers, under her mouth.

And she’s never thought of him this way before, as delicate — she’s never thought of him a lot of ways, of course, she’s practically just met him — but he is.

She manages to pull herself back as the rest of the world comes into focus, as she remembers May beside them and FitzSimmons and Ward rushing to this cabin, but she keeps her hands wrapped around his wrists until they have to move him, until she can’t anymore.

 

2.

“Coulson.”

She sets her fingers on his right wrist gently, calling his attention away from the pattern he’s carving into the wall. When he turns to look at her, it’s like he isn’t there for a moment, like she’s staring into something else when their eyes lock, and then he’s back.

“Skye,” he exhales. Inhales.

He keeps the knife clutched in his fingers, but drops his hand from the wall, and her hand falls, too, keeps the gentle contact more by accident than by design.

She rubs her fingers in a soft circle over his wrist, feels the muscle playing under her fingers, and tries to calm herself.

“It’s almost morning.”

May’s gone on a mission, and she’s spent the night in here with him, trying to doze on the couch while he works. It is...not easy.

“Right.”

He squeezes his eyes shut.

“Are you…” She frowns at the look of near agony on his face, presses her fingers into the tense muscles under her hand because it’s the only way she can think of to comfort him and he doesn’t seem to mind. “Was it...enough?”

It’s been coming more frequently, she understands that. Like each time is less and less effective at getting out whatever it is that’s in his brain. Whatever it is that's in his brain that's somehow connected to her.

“Yeah,” he answers, tries to smile, like he hadn’t looked pained almost beyond recognition a moment ago.

It’s a lie. She can usually tell when he’s lying, maybe because he’s actually really bad at lying to her, but she’s not super good at calling him on his lies, either. (It’s why this has all happened like this, why she sat on his lies for months until they blew up.) Something tells her he’ll be back at it tonight, and that he wants to protect her from that.

“Okay.”

She squeezes her fingers around his wrist again so she can feel his pulse, his alien blood rushing through his veins too quickly. The same blood that’s rushing through her.

It makes her panic a little — every time she thinks of it, she panics a little — but he actually seems to calm under her touch. She can feel the muscles under her fingers relax, even if he’s still a little twitchy from his ordeal, and it reminds her to breathe.

They’ll figure this out, the two of them together. No matter how terrifying it all is, she’s not alone.

He looks down at her hand over his arm, seems to contemplate it for so long that she becomes way too aware of how she’s touching him, of how strange it is, but when he looks up to meet her eyes, he’s smiling.

Like, a real smile.

“I’m okay, Skye. Thank you.”

She nods once, a lump still in her throat, and slips her fingers from his arm to head back to her bunk.

 

3.

His whole arm shakes as he picks up the coffee pot, so so slowly, and she pauses next to him, waiting for her turn. He’s doing it left handed, which isn’t even how he’d have done this _before_ , and for one stupid second, she’s angry.

As though Coulson would do this just to remind her of what had happened, of what her mother did, of the consequences of her stupid desire for her family. (There’s something else, too, that she can’t quite name, wouldn’t even _want_ to name. But she’d found comfort in thinking about the way they were connected — the same alien blood in their veins — and the prosthetic is like a constant reminder that actually they’re different, that the force that changed her almost killed him. And it’s terrible, but she had wanted...)

Daisy pushes aside her own stupid feelings and watches him, his eyes narrowed in concentration, the tip of his tongue almost poked past his lips, as he pours coffee into his mug, She watches him breathe and steady the prosthetic — it feels weird to call it _his wrist_ , _his hand_ , but it is now. He fills his mug without spilling on himself, keeping that metal part above the hand — _his_ hand, _his wrist_ — stable and strong.

He sets his coffee mug on the counter by the heating unit, looks at it with something like quiet pride.

And of course Daisy feels like shit, making everything about her, about what she's lost, instead of about the way he’s progressing. Coulson glances at her, something soft in his gaze, and she wants to congratulate him or touch the prosthetic — _his wrist_ — comfortingly or _hug_ him, but instead she extends her own mug for him to fill.

He smiles at her, like maybe he understands the gesture how she means it, and she watches him steady his wrist again to pour.

 

4.

“Good job tonight,” Coulson tells her, his voice soft as they enter the Zeppelin to head back to base.

“Thanks to good support.” Daisy smiles at him, trying for wide and easy because she’s been trying to be more easy, and he ducks his head down almost bashfully.

He’s been so _careful_ around her since she’s been back, since he’s running missions with her as _Agent Coulson_ , like he’s convinced that if he says the wrong thing, she’ll bolt. And it’s sweet — she can’t remember anyone ever being so careful, ever trying so hard to respect her boundaries, ever really letting her _have_ boundaries — but it’s also...frustrating. This artificial distance between them.

There had been a time when she’d been scared of the fact that they’re different, that she’s Inhuman and he’s not. It’s never mattered to Coulson — she knows it hasn’t, not ever — but it had still scared her.

Now...not so much. Maybe the fading memories of her differences with Lincoln, maybe the people she’s met, maybe just that Coulson tries so hard to understand. Maybe that he’s still _here_. After everything, he’s still here.

Daisy glances at him just in time to see him drop his gaze, like he’s been caught watching her, and her skin almost buzzes with something familiar, but so, so different. At least where Phil Coulson is concerned.

She draws in a slow breath and unzips the top part of her field uniform, slides the jacket off her shoulders to reveal the tank beneath, and _almost_ doesn’t notice the way he barely tilts his head to watch, _almost_ doesn’t notice the way his lips part slightly before he turns away as her bare shoulders come into view. But she _does_ notice, and it makes her...restless.

After a beat, he follows suit, sliding his own jacket off. He wears a pale blue button down underneath, open at the neck since he rarely seems to go for suits and ties anymore.

(She can’t say she minds.)

He’s quiet, though, doesn’t turn back towards her

“I mean it,” Daisy says, trying to somehow close this gap between them. “You saved my ass tonight.”

“Nah,” he shakes his head. “You don’t need me for that.”

“I still…” She frowns, afraid of saying too much, afraid because she’s _not_ easy, no matter what she pretends. She’s nervous for a million reasons she can’t quite articulate — scared to death of letting him back in and also of never closing this distance between them — and being falsely _easy_ doesn’t actually help her deal with any of it. She thinks that maybe, without consciously meaning to, she’s been putting space between her and Coulson, too.

“Daisy?” His eyes are so _hopeful_ , something she thinks he’s been trying not to show her, and it makes her want to step closer to him.

“I like knowing you have my back.” There’s too much emphasis on the _you_ , perhaps, but she means it is the thing. She means it, and even if it’s hard to say, she wants him to know that it matters, that he matters to her.

He stares at her with eyes that shine even in the dim ambient light in the cargo bay, like he’s suddenly too emotional, and then he looks down, blinks too much.

She watches as he unbuttons the cuffs of his shirt and rolls them up, first the left until she can see the band of silver where the prosthetic part of his arm attaches, and then starting on the right. It’s about distance, she knows it is; he’s trying to keep some distance. But she can’t help being charmed by his wet eyes, by the way he’s almost shaking as his wrists come into view, by the way he’s so affected.

“I’ll always have your back,” he manages, probably too much emphasis on the _always_ , even though his eyes stay turned down to look at his wrists.

 _Always_ , though.

It makes her shiver.

She thinks about him chasing after her, and about everything he’s tried to make SHIELD be, and about how he’s had her back all this time, just done things for her with no expectation. Not even the expectation that she’d be here, not even the expectation that she’d _know_.

It makes her eyes and nose burn, even though he can’t seem to meet her gaze. Instead, she watches as he keeps working on the cuff of his right arm, folding up the sleeve slowly and carefully, barely even fumbling with the delicate task.

Watching his forearm come into view is strangely intimate, like she’s watching him strip, watching him expose himself to her, and the thought makes her breath catch in her chest.

And she doesn’t exactly mean to — except that she wants to close the distance between them and maybe she kind of _does_ mean to — when she reaches out and wraps her fingers around his bared wrist.

Coulson doesn’t object.

Instead, he just lets her pull him gently towards her, lets her cradle his right wrist in both her hands, so she just holds it, looks down at it for too long. And she remembers holding his wrists once a long time ago, a lifetime ago, thinking about how delicate he was, how breakable, how he needed protecting.

(He still does.)

But he’s strong, too. And he tries so hard to take care of her, harder than anyone else ever has, even when caring for her means backing off.

It makes her smile, and she brings his hand up to press her mouth against it, to the top of his wrist so his arm hair tickles her nose and she can feel all his delicate little bones against her closed lips.

She glances up at him through her eyelashes, sees the way his mouth almost falls open, and she parts her lips, kisses his wrist for real, lets herself taste the salt on his skin.

“Always?” She asks, words half-muffled against him, and it means so much more than what she says. But despite the way her heart beats hard in her throat, she’s suddenly just as easy as she’s been pretending to be.

He meets her eyes, lets her see all the things he’s been trying so hard to keep from her, all the things shrouded by that artificial distance. There’s surprise, too, like maybe even he hadn’t fully known.

She turns his hand and kisses his wrist again, the underside this time so his pulse beats against her lips, blood pumping hard and fast through his veins.

His left hand reaches forward to touch her shoulder.

“ _Yes_.”

 

5.

She wraps the end of the tie carefully around his left wrist. Logically, she knows he can’t actually feel it, but she presses her lips there anyways. He likes it, she knows he does, and there was so much guilt wrapped up in even looking at his prosthetic at first, that it feels good to her, too.

Daisy kisses it again, meets his eyes as her lips press against him.

“Okay?”

“Yes,” he answers easily, like none of this has phased him at all.

Daisy smiles down at him from where she sits, straddling his bare chest, and reaches for his other arm. He gives it easily, and she kisses this wrist softly, too, before wrapping the other end of the tie around it.

They’re not very secure knots, but it’s more about the psychology of the thing than the actual physical restraint — Coulson had told her that.

(Back when they had started talking about this, Coulson had also told her that she wouldn’t have to tie him up to do whatever she wanted with him — the ties were to reinforce what they would have already agreed on. And he, apparently, would agree to whatever she wanted.

“Whatever I want? No limits?” Daisy had asked, voice shaking a little because even if this was all old hat to him, it was new to her. And it’s scary to have someone be so calm about the idea of handing over control, even though she wants it. Needs it, even, in a way she can’t put words to.

“I don’t like being hurt,” Coulson had answered, shrugging like this wasn’t a real concern he had with her — being hurt. She can’t bring herself to ask if someone has hurt him like this before, in bed, in a way that might have violated his trust. But someone _must have_ , she thinks, for him to answer like that.

It scares her, imagining Coulson hurt.

It scares her, imagining hurting him.

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I know.” He had smiled, sweet and gentle and almost naive, almost like she hadn’t ever hurt him before, almost like he didn’t even know exactly what kind of damage she could do.

He’s always trusted her more than he probably should have, though.)

Once she’s got both wrists tied, she takes a breath, tries to find her confidence in this.

“You trust me?” It’s a scary question to ask, even now, even after all this time, even when he answers it every day in big and small ways.

“I trust you,” Coulson says, easy but _serious_ , his eyes holding hers.

Daisy presses her lips to the tie around his wrist because it means everything — everything — that he’ll give himself over like this so easily. He doesn’t even know what it means to her, she imagines (she couldn’t exactly explain it, either, the tangled up cravings for control and trust, for taking care of him and _having_ him).

“If it’s too much…”

“Rainbows,” Coulson recites their agreed upon word. “And that goes for you, too.”

Because of course he tries to take care of her even when she’s about to tie him to the bed.

Daisy nods and runs her hands up his arms, feels out his muscles all the way to his wrists, and nothing seems delicate about him today. He’s strong and solid, even as he lets her stretch his arms up.

He’s eager once she hooks the middle part of the tie to headboard, wrists held over his head —  eager to give up control, eager to let her have him, eager for whatever comes next.

It’s not something that’s new to her, that Coulson is eager and more than a little submissive, but she’s never seen it quite like this, never felt quite so powerful, so in control.

She takes all her power, all her control, and touches him gently, like he might break apart under her hands.

“Daisy,” he breathes her name as she takes her time, as her fingers stroke slowly up and down his chest and slide up his thighs and press inside of him.

He comes with his head turned to the side, face buried in his left bicep and back arched off the bed, grunting her name. _She_ does that, makes him feel good, nothing but pleasure under her hands.

It makes her feel ashamed of herself that this has scared her so much, like when given the  chance to have complete control she might hurt him, might do something terrible. (She remembers every terrible thing she had done, thinks about it too much — what she’s capable of, what she could do, how her hands could hurt him, could break him. The worst thing about all of _that_ , all the memories of Hive,is that she had felt in control then, had been acting on what she wanted. Or at least, on perversions of what she had wanted — making Coulson, her family, like her. Never being alone. It had all felt like her plan, like what she wanted. Control without control.)

Daisy lets out a breath as she looks down at him, Coulson all splayed across her bed, his harsh breaths and his soft smile and his wrists still secured above his head. This, _this_ , is real control, and it's only good. Something settles in her chest, something she wasn’t even fully aware had been unsettled.

“Good?” She whispers quietly and tugs the tie off of his wrists; he hums his satiation as she leans down and kisses him.

“I knew it would be,” he murmurs against her lips.

Daisy smiles as she smooths her thumbs over his wrists — the delicate bones and the twitching muscles and the strong pulse.

And his trust in her means a lot, but she hadn’t expected it to make her feel so much more trust in _herself_.

 

+1

They keep it simple, just them at a courthouse, and it’s perfect even if it comes faster than either of them would have planned it.

Daisy’s never exactly planned it, if she’s honest, but mostly because she’s never imagined she would have anything like this, like him, before. But it looks like maybe they won’t legally be able to do it soon, and she’ll be damned if she’ll let some shitty xenophobic laws stop her from having him.

She promises to love, honor, cherish, and protect him, means it more than anything she's ever said. When the judge prompts her, she wraps her fingers around his wrist and raises his left hand, but Coulson shakes his head, holds up his right instead.

“So I can feel it,” he requests, voice so quiet the judge probably can’t hear. She kisses his knuckles and takes the right one instead, holds his hand steady as she slides the ring onto his finger.

When the judge declares them husband and wife, she doesn’t actually say anything about kissing the bride, so Daisy takes it upon herself to kiss Coulson’s hand, high up on the edge of his wrist, and then the underside so she can feel his pulse beat against her lips, pumping the same alien blood that’s in her veins.

It comforts her, has always comforted her, to feel them connected by something bigger than themselves. But now, her her left thumb moves against the ring he’d slid onto her finger, and her right thumb presses against _his_ matching one, and she feels a different kind of connection.

Because for all that it feels inevitable, sometimes, that he would be the most important person in her life — like he’s belonged to her since before they even met — _this_ is about choices, about every decision they’ve made to stay, every decision to care for each other, about all the decisions they’ll make in the future.

Coulson sweeps her into a hug and presses his lips against hers, decides to kiss her regardless of ‘kiss the bride,’ and Daisy kisses him back.


End file.
